


Eight Times Dhaymin Dhalsiv Set Something On Fire

by Kalium



Series: Manifestations - Extras [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Childhood, Community: runaway_tales, Family, Fantasy, Fire, Gen, Monsters, Pre-Canon, Psychic Bond, Wakes & Funerals, Winter Solstice, multiple timeframes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-13
Updated: 2011-11-13
Packaged: 2017-10-26 00:59:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 2,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/276804
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kalium/pseuds/Kalium
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A look at the family life of the Dhalsivs throughout the years.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Fire

**Author's Note:**

> Written as a set for the "Elemental Bunnies" list on runaway_tales.

Dhaymin was so proud of his fire.

Well, it wasn’t really all his, not yet. Father had helped him, holding his hands to show him how to strike the flint and make the spark, and really, he’d done most of it, but Dhaymin didn’t mind. After all, he was five, and that was old enough to know how to make fire. That made him almost a man! Besides, fire was his favourite thing, because it meant Mother or Father or even both of them were home, and they’d all sit around it together. They’d been like that all the time ages and ages ago way back when Jen first came along, but then he’d gotten bigger and somehow that meant their parents kept being “busy” all the time. Dhaymin didn’t really know what that meant, but it didn’t matter because it meant the fire was special. It meant everyone was a family.

He curled up on the rug before the hearth as the dry heat spread through the room, and closed his eyes.


	2. Water

He rushed up the last flight of stairs, the cold water sloshing all over him, and burst into his room. The bed was ablaze, the drapes and wall hangings covered in rising flames. With a great heave he flung what was left of the water, bucket and all, over the mess. A satisfying hiss rose up from the scene, the fire turning to black smoke, and he stared at the charred, soaking mess.

Behind him, the door creaked slightly, just enough to give away that someone had pushed inside. Dhaymin nearly jumped, but there was only one person who could sneak around so quietly (though he was really going to have to get better at it.), and he was now standing beside him, nearly bent double over the pail of water he’d dragged up the stairs. Even though the fire was gone, Dhaymin took it from his hands and threw it over the remains of his room anyway.

“I did it!” said Jen, his cheer only slightly marred by breathlessness. “I did it, I put out the fire, I did-”

Dhaymin wasn’t paying attention. “Where am I going to sleep?” And, worse, what were Mother and Father going to do when they saw it?

“Let’s hide it!” said Jen.

Dhaymin looked back at his ruined room. It wasn’t as if he’d meant to do this, but what you _meant_ didn’t matter when mothers and fathers were concerned. Maybe Jen was right? It was really embarrassing, being outwitted by a five year old, and to make it worse, Jen did it all the time. But at least some of the sheets had survived, and maybe they could fix it? Or maybe Jen had actually had a bad idea for once.

The problem was, it was the only idea they had. “Well then ,” he said, grabbing the nearest sheet, “help me!”


	3. Light

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Takes place on the same day as [Midwinter](http://archiveofourown.org/works/276798).

“Jen, wake up! It’s midnight, you’re not supposed to be asleep!”

Jen immediately snapped awake, leaping down from the chair he’d been curled up in. “Sorry! Did I-”

“Shut up, Jen!” said Dhaymin. “It’s just me!”

At least, Dhaymin thought, as Jen followed him, he hoped it was midnight. It was so hard to tell, with the world wrapped in darkness for all but a few gloomy noonday hours, but the candles he’d lit then had now burnt halfway, and that was the best he could do. Well, it didn’t matter too much as long as he got the sun chant right. He stepped over toward the low table where the trio of candles burned, the only light in the vast, cold hall. Jen followed, the blanket he’d wrapped himself up in trailing on the floor.

Dhaymin straightened himself up to his full height, and let out a small cough.

“By the light of the... um...” His voice trailed away, and he grasped for the memories. What had the rest of the words been? Deep down he knew them. In his breath he meant them, but it wasn’t enough to just mean them, you had to say them too. “Jen... words?”

“Ha!” said Jen, jumping up and down as much as the blanket would let him. “Dhaymin forgot the words! Dhaymin forgot the wooorrrds!”

“Shut up!” Dhaymin whirled around to face him. “Don’t you know what happens if you don’t get the words right? The sun doesn’t come back and the monsters come out.” He leaned a little closer, so he was looking right into Jen’s eyes. “You know the ones. The ones that rip out your fingernails and wear them on their-”

“But there’s _already_ monsters,” Jen pointed out, in the don’t-you-see logic of six year olds everywhere.

“Yes,” said Dhaymin, “but they don’t do the thing with the fingernails.”

“Then I’ll say the words!”

Of course. Of _course_ Jen knew the chant of the sun. Dhaymin slunk back into the dark as Jen took his space and began to speak, his voice thick with importance. Well, it would still work, as long as Jen did it right, and Dhaymin wasn’t even sure if he believed in the fingernail-monsters. If anyone had asked him in the middle of the day, he’d say no. But everything was easy in the middle of the day, even now when the sun merely sulked across the horizon. Everything was easy then, even going out and catching that squirrel so Jen would have had his winter feast. The feast that Father should have declared.

Their parents were always gone for days, but they’d never left them alone for the midwinter. And then there was the matter of the box. Jen didn’t know about the box, because Father had taken Dhaymin aside and told him that only he should know about it, because he was old enough. And then he’d pressed it into Dhaymin’s hands, and told him to keep it in the safest place he could think of, and never, ever open it, unless he and Mother never came home.

Maybe now was that night. Maybe, when Jen was finished, he’d slip away to the secret hiding place that nobody knew about, just as soon as-

And then the room fell silent.

“Dhaymin, what are you doing?”

“Uh, nothing?” Dhaymin turned around, to see Jen standing by the blazing candles. His brother, finished with the sun-chant, wandered over to where he was standing. Holding one edge of the blanket, he held it out to him.

“You look cold,” he said.


	4. Wood

“Agh!” yelled Dhaymin. “Why won’t this stupid thing light?”

“That won’t burn,” said Jen, from right behind him.

“Agh!” said Dhaymin a second time, turning around to see him standing there with am armful of wood. “Stop doing that! One day I’ll think you’re a monster and cut _your_ head off.”

“But I’d be really bad at that,” said Jen. “Being a monster, I mean. I’m not scary enough! Look, I got you something to burn.” He set aside Dhaymin’s failed campfire and laid out his own fuel. “What you’ve got’s too damp, that’s why it won’t burn, see? Go on, try that.” He stepped back, letting Dhaymin inspect the results.

“I _hate_ you,” he said, setting off a spark. Just as expected, the pile flared into life, a spot of warmth in a gloomy world of half-light. Dhaymin rubbed his hands together, letting tendrils of heat sink into his body. “Stars’ll be out properly soon.” They’d probably been walking in circles for ages, and that meant Father would be unhappy, but Dhaymin supposed there was just more to learn. It had barely been a day since he’d left them alone, with instructions to return and ensure both he and Jen did so intact. “Come on, Jen, don’t look like that. This time tomorrow, we’ll be home!”


	5. Metal

The monster lay sprawled on the ground, its rough, earth toned coat ruffled by the breeze, its long, yellowed teeth exposed, lips peeled back in a snarl even in death. Sparks and embers from the fire landed in its coat, glowing for a few brief seconds before fading into ash. Dhaymin and Jen, still slightly short of breath, leaned over to examine the prize, but Father held out an arm to stop them. “Wait,” he said. “What must you never do?”

“Get its blood in yours,” chorused the brothers, with the air of those who had been taught something repeatedly for as long as they could remember.

“Good, both of you,” said Father. He passed a long knife to Dhaymin, who took the smooth, slightly cold handle in his hands. “And you do remember why you must not get the blood inside you?”

“I know,” said Jen. “Because it takes you over. It turns you into a monster too.”

“Very good, Jen,” Father went on. From the corner of his eye, Dhaymin spotted Jen’s tiny smile, barely disguised pride in the rare praise. “Why is this especially dangerous?”

“Because it take so long,” Jen went on. “You might not know they’re tarnished for months, maybe years.” He must have anticipated the next question, because he took a deep breath and continued before Father could speak. “You find them out with sea water, and you staunch the tarnish with hot stones and the blood of your emblem.”

“You’ve been studying, I see!” said Father, and he was smiling, actually smiling! Even Dhaymin couldn’t help a grin. “But study only takes you part of the way. Dhaymin, you know what to do now.”

Dhaymin didn’t need to be told again. He stepped up to the fire and, holding out the knife, thrust the blade deep into the flames. He ignored the heat on his skin, holding still until the blade glowed red. Only then did he pull away, bending over the creature’s body. Even with monsters, there were rules to follow. You had to make sure the body was cut open so that the breath could escape, otherwise the soul was trapped. And what if that soul had been a person, in some other life, or what if it might be a person in times to come? You never knew, not even with monsters.

So he dug the blade deep, through the shaggy coat and tough hide, and, as the scents of burnt hair and charred meat rose into the air, released the beast’s soul to wherever it may go.


	6. Air

Dhaymin laid the tiny body out on the ground.

“He never spoke,” the woman had told him, as she handed him the limp, cloth-wrapped bundle. “Not a word. I... had no choice. I waited, but I knew I’d just be waiting another month and another and... Please, make your father understand.”

“He will.” That was all Dhaymin had said to her as he’d carried the child away. And now it was just himself and the body, out in the woods, where no real people might have to watch. An early memory played out inside his head, of the day Jen had earned his name. Dhaymin had been too small to understand at the time, but he remembered the joy in the family - that their younger son was not a hidden evil spirit, that he could have a name and a life, that he was a real person, with a voice of his own.

It was usually Father’s job, as lord of the deep forests and their people, to deal with such things, but with him, yet again, chasing after his endless quarry, the duty fell to Dhaymin.

Father would know if he did it wrong. Even if he was far away, he knew. He could read you, tell from the look on your face. There was no sense in hiding it, and so Dhaymin used the hot knife as befitted a monster. But, in the act of releasing the breath and sending off the soul, before he set light to the body so that the blood would not spill, he whispered the wrong chant - for the dead, but those who had lived as people.

Father would know, but he would deal with it later.


	7. Earth

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dhaymin's POV of [Jen's Choice, part 5](http://archiveofourown.org/works/251225/chapters/388979).

“I shouldn’t be doing this.” In what context, Dhaymin wasn’t sure. Kejik and Mother would insist he shouldn’t even be out of bed, let alone warding off a monster. As far as Dhaymin was concerned, it was irrelevant. Pain eased eventually, and wounds healed. And if he could only do one thing in his new world of darkness, through with he fumbled with his hands, it would be to save his brother.

If only they’d had some wolf’s blood to hand.

“I wouldn’t have anyone else do it,” he heard Jen say.

“I know,” said Dhaymin.

It wouldn’t solve the problem, if Jen was, indeed, tarnished, but it might buy them time. Dhaymin took a few tentative steps toward the fireplace, following the heat and his memories, but after only a few he dropped to a crouch and shuffled along, feeling the way toward the hearth with his hands. _I’m fucking sick of this,_ he thought, but he never spoke it out loud. Jen didn’t need it, and Mother might hear. And if Mother tried to call him useless one more time...

His hands closed over a stone. Even through the thick gloves he could feel the heat, threatening to burn through if he held it too long. “Jen? Keep talking.”

“I’m over here.”

With his free hand, Dhaymin managed to find his way back to where Jen waited, seated. “Let me find it.” Brushing his free hand up Jen’s right arm, he felt the ragged knot of scar tissue, rough and scabby to the touch even through the gloves. “Fuck, Jen. I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine. I won’t scream.”

Not long ago, Dhaymin would have wished Father was here, to guide him through the rite. But what good was that? Father was gone, just like his eyes. And you didn’t get something back when it was gone. You kept hold of what was left.

He pressed the stone tight to Jen’s arm.

To his credit, Jen never screamed.


	8. Dark

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dhaymin's POV of [Jen's Choice, part 10](http://archiveofourown.org/works/251225/chapters/389015).

Dhaymin gripped tight into Jen’s arm, bent under the weight of his pack, his feet occasionally stumbling over a stray rock or root. “Fuck... Jen, are we far? I’m not used to this.”

“Well, I can still see the holding,” Jen said, “because it’s on fire. What the fuck is this all about, Dhaymin?”

“Told you. I’m coming with you. Nothing else left.” Dhaymin took a few deep breaths to steady himself, and gave Jen’s arm a squeeze.

“I... I didn’t know if you meant it,” Jen said. His voice had shifted, no longer the gasps of a fleeing, out of breath man, but faltering and unsteady.

“Course I meant it, you idiot. Now, I suppose we’re far enough to stop for a moment. Tell me what it looks like.”

“The hall is burning,” said Jen, his voice now steady. “Flames at every window. Little bits of light in the dark, like midwinter candles.”

Dhaymin smiled, the scene vivid in his head. He’d thrown down the lantern in just the right spot. “Don’t worry about Mother,” he said. “She’ll be able to put it out.”

“You set fire to the lodge.”

“I know, we established that,” said Dhaymin, giving Jen’s arm a gentle tug. “Come on now, you silly idiot. We’re going to find you some help.”


End file.
